Facebook has launched Partner Categories, a new way for brands or establishments to deliver targeted ads to people near them, or in the market for specific items or based on people’s search or purchase history on their desktop and even mobile devices.

Partner Categories uses data from select third parties such as Acxiom, Datalogix, and Epsilon, but Facebook says users shouldn’t worry about their privacy as the social giant assures that no personal information is shared between it and the third parties.

This new initiative will launch with more than 500 unique groups that would work well with Facebook’s existing targeting options.  This will allows advertisers to refine their ad campaigns so it would reach just the right people – which hopefully means no more annoying ads for things that you are not interested in.

“Our ultimate goal is to make the ads people see on Facebook as relevant as the information they see from their friends,” Yvette Lui, director of global marketing solutions, global data & audience partnerships at Facebook, noted in a news release put out by Epsilon. “Targeting features like custom audiences and partner categories help make this possible. Our partnership with Epsilon gives marketers a more accurate and effective way to reach the right groups of real people, which makes for a better ad experience.”

Partner Categories will be available to US advertisers in Power Editor and API starting today.

Hot on the heels of Twitter and Google

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Facebook isn’t the only one focusing on targeted ads.

Last year, Twitter and American Express announced a partnership that would allow small businesses to advertise on Twitter.  The two then launched AmEx Sync which allows people with eligible AmEx cards to sync their cards with Twitter and get special product deals if they tweet special hashtags.  Promoting brands via special offers isn’t something new in the advertising world but using hashtags to do so is.

Google recently updated Google Places for business by making it easier to use, edits now go live faster and it’s also more integrated with other Google products.  This made it easier for people to discover places near them or discover new places when they visit new cities, countries or towns.  Also, by making edits go live faster, when establishments offer price cuts, consumers will be notified as soon as the ad is published.

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